


The Rock, the Vulture, and the Chain

by Tlon



Category: Fevre Dream - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Blood, M/M, Power Dynamics, Sexual Coercion, Steamboats probably are actually the vampire's natural habitat, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-05
Updated: 2015-07-08
Packaged: 2018-04-07 19:57:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4276017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tlon/pseuds/Tlon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For all his power, Julian couldn't force Joshua York to kill. But he could force him into anything else, if it amused him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Lord Byron's "Prometheus."

At midnight, when the sun had safely disappeared and the river trash had retired to their cabins for another night of uneasy dreams, Damon Julian held court on the deck of the _Ozymandias_.

There was a time people would have called Sour Billy Tipton river trash as well, but if they did it here, he'd have stuck them good and thrown them in the boiler. All his newfound confidence, though, wasn't enough to still the shiver as Julian and his men and women filed gracefully around the table.

Men, women – they weren't either, of course. Their pale skin all but glowed under the lamplight, their well-turned bodies forever young. Even the lights were only there out of quaint tradition; they could see just as well without them. They waited for Julian to seat himself. He did, shifting his hand just slightly enough to beckon Sour Billy. The shiver was gone, and Billy's self-regard soared anew: he wasn't just any officer, he was Julian's right-hand man, worthy of sitting at the table right beside him. And that was only now, while he was still human.

The seat to Julian's left remained empty as the others arranged themselves. Everyone knew who Julian was waiting for, his absence as conspicuous as his presence would have been.

As a timid, silent waiter set their plates, Julian's gaze went straight through the meal, straight through Billy... maybe through the whole boat, to things Billy couldn't see. “Do you think I'll have to send you up to fetch our dear Joshua?”

“No,” said a voice behind them.

Sour Billy turned and scowled. Once he'd been _changed_ , Joshua York wouldn't be able to sneak up on him like this, descending the stairs oh-so-quiet in his fine white suit. As it was, York ignored him and took the seat that Julian offered, eyes locked on the ground the whole time. “Thank you, Damon,” he said stiffly. It was hard to remember how much louder that voice had been when Julian had first come aboard the _Ozymandias_ – or, more rightly, the _Fevre Dream_ – and York fancied himself some sort of king. Well, Julian had put paid to that.

“The pleasure's mine.” Julian tipped his head towards a glass on the table. “Would you care to pour a drink?”

The scowl turned to something nearer a smile. York's face had gone flat, hard, like a man who'd found himself on the edge of a crevasse and was deciding whether to jump. His grey eyes darted upwards, meeting Julian's with the force of an ice floe against a granite cliff. But just as quickly, they dropped again. That was Julian – strength, power, cruelty. York's shoulders slumped, and he pushed back a shirt sleeve, exposing the pale wrist underneath. Without hesitation, he tore into the flesh with one nail, letting his blood patter into the glass. It clotted so quickly that he had to dig into his wrist twice more before he had enough to satisfy Julian.

York's blood looked like port wine in the lamplight, and Julian rolled it around the glass like a fine vintage before tasting.

“As lovely as you are,” he said finally. York's eyes were still low as he rubbed at his wrist, and wiped the excess blood onto a napkin, and turned down his sleeve again. All the others, who had been watching keenly, busied themselves with their knives and forks.

Around the table, Sour Billy heard smatterings of conversation: a piece of gossip here, a bit of speculation about the next port there. But Damon Julian did not speak, and he did not eat, once the glass was dry. He merely sat with his hand curled loosely around it, so quiet he might have been a posed corpse presiding over a ship full of coffins.

York didn't eat either, but that was like as not more out of sullenness than anything else. In the weeks since Julian had found the _Fevre Dream_ and bested him, he'd come slightly out of his torpor, but it all seemed to flow back whenever Julian broke and bled him. Now, he looked at an empty plate, absentmindedly touching the healed wound.

“Not hungry for cattle food?” Julian asked abruptly, as though woken from a sleep. “It's a pity you burned that last man, Billy; we might have had some use of him. Joshua doesn't seem offended by... hideous meat. Were you saving Captain Marsh, perhaps?”

On the table, York's fist clenched, his eyes burning into the table. “Be careful,” he said, voice low and dangerous. “You're more dumb animal than he was.”

Julian gave a tooth-baring smile. “Ah, of course,” he purred. “But I wonder what that would make you? Less than either of us, I'd think, by your estimation.”

That seemed to quiet York, for a moment. He glanced down at the rest of the room's faces – hard, cool, predator's faces, jaundiced in the lamplight. Valerie and a couple of others looked down, as if pretending not to see him. The rest returned his gaze.

Julian put a hand on his shoulder. “Do they need their pale king? You look the part tonight,” he said. “But only... look. Give me your neck.”

York stiffened. “You already have my blood,” he said.

“And I'll have it again. As many times as I want, if I choose to. Isn't that right?”

The hand slid up York's white lapel, and to the skin above it, barely darker. It settled under his chin, lifting his face towards Julian.

“Look at me.”

For a moment, York's eyes lit with such fury that Sour Billy's glass nearly slipped from his hand. There were years in them, years of unspeakable horror and transcendent beauty and arcane knowledge. Even Julian's weren't quite like them. But Julian's were ancient and hungry, the eyes of a beast. And no man, no matter how clever, could cage himself up with a beast and live.

York trembled. His hand clutched the table until Sour Billy wondered if it might break. And, finally, he relented. “Yes,” he said, jerking his head away and exposing his neck. “Do it. Master.”

Julian toyed with the top button of York's jacket. “No need to ruin a good suit,” he said.

York nodded listlessly. Slowly, he stripped off his jacket, loosened the buttons of his starched shirt. His expression, now, was one that Sour Billy knew perfectly well. He'd seen it in the eyes of pretty slaves he took to bed – helplessness, resignation, and a vague look of disbelief, as if York barely understood how he'd gotten to the table. Julian might not hit or chain him, but this was its own kind of control, and its own kind of lust.

York pulled his shirt off one shoulder and closed his eyes, flinching as Julian's teeth found his neck. Julian drank deep, as though he might never let go, as though he had drawn a lover into a kiss. When he withdrew, he dipped his fingers to the rapidly healing wound, collecting the blood he'd left behind. He touched it to York's pale lips, slipping his fingertips between them. York's eyes opened slowly, their gaze far away. Sour Billy understood now why Julian called the man beautiful.

“He is wonderful like this, isn't he?” said Julian, raising his head to look straight at Billy, as if he could read minds – _could_ they read minds? “All the more so when you feel how much he loathes this submission. When you imagine how it must feel to be used like a slave in front of the people who once called you _master_.”

York's hand clenched on the table, until Billy thought he saw blood under the nails. But his expression did not change.

“I think dear Joshua may want to be alone for a while. Or... nearly alone. Would you care to come up and dine with me, love? You must be getting thirsty.”

This time there was no battle of wills. York simply nodded blankly, pale neck still exposed to the night air.

“Oh, and Billy – come up, when you can. I think you might find it entertaining.”


	2. Chapter 2

Maybe they talked when they were alone, York and Julian. Sour Billy didn't think so. Julian was sitting back in his upholstered chair when Billy walked in, and York had his elbows on the nearly empty table, one hand casually against its cold green lamp. Neither of them looked up.

“Why don't you have some manners for our guest, Joshua? Greet him.”

York had rebuttoned his shirt, but the jacket was still gone, and Billy could see the outline of his broad shoulders in the dim light. He rose fluidly, catlike, then stopped and looked guardedly at Julian.

“Billy thinks you as beautiful as I do, dear Joshua. We owe so... very much to him, I thought perhaps you might want to show your gratitude.” Julian leaned forward, eyes shining. “Kneel.”

York froze, his cool, pale face betraying only a hint of confusion, and then fear, and then anger.

“Julian...”

“Now.”

He slipped to his knees. “There. Is this enough, Julian? Have you had enough?”

“Enough? No, not yet. Unbutton your shirt.”

York's fingers unfastened the buttons, preternaturally graceful. His eyes never left the ground.

“Take it off.”

Billy stared at the smooth line of skin between the two halves of York's shirt. Hesitantly, York parted it with his fingers and let it drop to the floor.

“He looks almost like a woman, in a way, Billy. His skin – his skin certainly feels it. Would you like to touch it?”

Sour Billy took a step forward. Standing, York dwarfed him. But he didn't look so proud now, with Billy standing over him. Just awfully tired.

“What do you _want_ , Julian,” York said.

“Why, I should think that would be obvious, Joshua, given how close you fancy yourself to the cattle. I want you to please dear Billy, here. And then I'll allow you to eat.”

Swiftly, York started to rise. “It can wait,” he said. “If --”

“If you don't, I wouldn't want to starve you. But it might be a different fare.” Julian laughed. “I could lock you up with that fine cook of yours, perhaps, next time we go ashore.”

He settled back to his knees, muscles tense across his shoulders. Emboldened, Billy grabbed a handful of York's white-blond hair and pulled his head back. Like Julian had done, he slid his hand down the side of his face, cupping the fine, clean line of his jaw.

“Doesn't it bother you, that you disgust him so?” York asked quietly. “He thinks that merely letting you touch me should be humiliating.”

Sour Billy dropped York's face and backhanded him, as hard as he could. He couldn't imagine it hurt much, but it raised a short-lived patch of red on his flawless skin. “Shut _up!_ ” he muttered, hitting him again. “I'm gonna do a lot more than touch, Josh.”

York was still as death as Billy unbuttoned his coat and opened his trousers. He didn't plead, didn't protest – he had learned that much of slavery, apparently. He only flicked a look at Julian, watching the proceedings like an old Roman emperor. Julian smiled.

York's mouth, his tongue, were as cool as his skin. He was clumsy, but that only made it better – maybe he'd never done this before, maybe Billy was the first man he'd ever had to get on his knees for. Billy grabbed the back of his neck and pressed into his mouth, until he heard the strangely human sound of York's breath catching.

“When he turns me,” Billy said between halting gasps, “I won't need no go-ahead from Julian for this.”

York did not respond, but it didn't matter. Soon Billy wouldn't just be an officer, he'd be a true master, and he'd be stronger than Joshua York – that he had no doubt of. He could order York to come up to his cabin, order him to crawl there, if he wanted. He could order him to strip, and make him look him in the eye while he did it. He could take a knife to York until he squirmed, carve him up and drink from him and make him beg for more. He could order him to lie back like a Natchez whore, forever young and beautiful and totally at his mercy.

He shuddered to orgasm and held York in place until he swallowed. Then he slapped him again, hard enough to throw him off balance. York seemed dazed, hair tangled and eyes unfocused. He fell forward and caught himself with one hand.

“Thank him, Joshua.”

Trembling, York lifted his head. His eyes glared out from under their long, pale lashes. There was no reason even he couldn't outstare York now, he thought. He'd mastered him as clearly as any man ever could.

But York looked at him with such fury and disgust and – Billy thought, unsettled – something like pity. Even those words weren't right. He looked at Billy with emotions Billy wasn't sure he'd ever felt, or that he wanted. With a forced cough and a clearing of his throat, Billy broke his gaze.

“Thank you,” said York.

Sour Billy buttoned his jacket with jerky motions. He looked carefully towards Julian, avoiding his stare as well. For a moment he felt invisible, caught between these two ancient not-men.

“Fetch a bottle from the cabinet for us, will you, Billy? Unmarked.”

York was back at the table, almost without Billy noticing how he'd gotten there. His shirt was still on the floor, chest clean except for a few fine, blond hairs. Billy set the bottle as far from his hand as possible.

“I'll just – I'll be going now, then,” he said.

“Most obliged, Billy. But don't imagine it'll be the last time,” he said, fussing with the edge of one ruffled sleeve. “Dear Joshua will need a lot of practice if he's to really fit in with the cattle.”

As Billy left, he snuck a last glance at the table. York's wine had run off his lip, and he wiped it away with one long, sharp-nailed finger. Hunched over the bottle, he looked like a animal, teeth red as a hunting dog's. He'd been wrong, Billy thought fleetingly, before pushing the idea away. York had been shut up with his own beast for years. And it was a wilder, fiercer one than Julian's.

He hoped, for both their sakes, that York never let it slip.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was a little conflicted about the point of view for this, but ultimately, I tried to stay at least reasonably within the style of the book, which was human-POV only. My only other significant note is that steamboat layout and nomenclature seems incredibly complicated.


End file.
